Argentina’s largest dairy company is changing hands — and the buyer is not European or North American, but a Peruvian conglomerate that has spent the past three years quietly assembling a dairy empire across Latin America.
Gloria Foods, the food division of Grupo Gloria, signed a definitive agreement to acquire 80% of Molfino Hermanos, which operates as Saputo Argentina, from Toronto-listed Saputo Inc. The deal, valued at C$855 million (around $630 million), includes two manufacturing plants in Santa Fe and Córdoba, a commercial office in Brazil, and a portfolio of household brands including La Paulina, Ricrem, and Molfino. Saputo Argentina generated roughly $881 million in revenue over the past four quarters, accounting for 7% of Saputo‘s global sales.
Saputo will retain a 20% minority stake and continue sourcing select Argentine products for its international supply chain. CEO Carl Colizza framed the sale as a strategic pivot to “enhance strategic focus and capital flexibility,” with after-tax proceeds of approximately $400 million earmarked for higher-growth platforms and share buybacks.
For Gloria, the logic runs in the opposite direction: expansion, not retreat. The Peruvian group, founded in 1972 and controlled by the Rodríguez Banda family, holds a dominant 76% share of Peru’s milk market and has been on an acquisition spree since 2022, when it purchased Chile’s Soprole from New Zealand’s Fonterra for $641 million and Ecuador’s Ecuajugos from Nestlé. The Saputo deal makes Gloria one of the largest dairy operators in South America, with a presence in Peru, Chile, Bolivia, Argentina, Colombia, Ecuador, Uruguay, and Puerto Rico.
The group’s ambitions extend beyond the region. At CADE Ejecutivos in late 2024, Gloria’s president Claudio Rodríguez said the company was exploring exports to China via the recently inaugurated Port of Chancay, the Chinese-built mega-port on Peru‘s coast. Plans for the Argentine operations include expanding into nutrition products such as infant formula, supplements for older adults, and energy drinks, using the acquired plants to produce inputs for those formulations.
The transaction is subject to regulatory approval and expected to close in the first quarter of Saputo’s fiscal 2027. If completed, it will mark one of the largest foreign investments by a Peruvian company in Argentina — and a signal that Latin American dairy consolidation is now being driven from Lima, not Montreal.